Episode 25 -- Greg Rogers: Brash, Compassionate...a Man with a Walrus Penis Collection

Greg Rogers is from Fredericton, New Brunswick. He has an accent from Eastern Canada. He stands about 6 feet and has longish white hair with wicked sideburns. The thing about Greg is, he's as brash and straightforward as you want people to be with no qualms about calling anyone out, especially himself. 

My old friend, 62 years old, who helped me when Ve'ahavta was established as the executive director of Na Me Res (Native Men's Residence), told me in the interview about his walrus penis collection. He told me the first term he learned in Inuktituk which directed as his wife to be, "pull down your pants".  He told me a story of a 'zaidy' (Yiddish for grandfather), whose family lived in his building out east, who used to take all the kids in the neighborhood out in his Cadillac on Sunday. And Greg said, one day something went wrong in the house and he (Greg) called the Zaidy, 'you dirty Jew'.  He said, "that's how i thanked him for taking us out. I'm ashamed of myself." 

The man does not follow convention when it comes to schmoozing. He says what's on his mind, exactly in the way he hears stuff in his head. That is refreshing because so many of us are just so full of shit and believe our own fiction.  

And the thing about Greg is (and he denies this) he is a highly compassionate human being having spent most of his working-life managing non-profits, usually assisting the homeless. He and his wife adopted two children, and he has the ability to understand individuals especially very complex ones. Listen to this episode and discover:

1.   Greg's overwhelming love for his wife, and their romance in Northern Canada (he sent her love notes every day for a year in her native language).

2.   Our shared discussion about the early days of Ve'ahavta and Na Me Res, especially when his clients offered to scrub swastikas off tombstones in a Jewish cemetery in eastern Toronto, and ultimately did so.

3. His thoughts about hatred, racism, good and kindness. He candidly and honestly tells us about his early dislike of French Canadians, which he eventually overcame.  

Greg is an honest, non-judgmental man. He looks at himself and fixes what is broken inside of him. He feels entirely blessed to have a woman he loves (married for 32 years), a wonderful career and great experiences in life.

Greg is a man to emulate and to be inspired by. And they simply don't get funnier that he is.

Hatradio! The show that schmoozes. 

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Yisha Ko'ach (Yiddish for 'way to go') to David Nefesh for the Hatradio! song, and to Howard Pasternack for his post-production work. They help make the show what it is. 

Credit for music in commercial:
Slow Burn Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/